Did the Scarsdale Diet Doctor Have an International Following?

The following article is about two very different people. It presents facts about both the Scarsdale Diet doctor and a woman who immigrated to the United States from Iran. How could two people from such very different cultures possibly have anything in common? Readers of the following article will discover that those two very different people shared much more than just the fact that both had lived where there was lots of sun and sand. They shared an appreciation for the health benefits of a certain round, yellow fruit, a fruit that was an integral part of the Scarsdale medical diet.

This writer does not know whether or not the Scarsdale diet doctor ever had an international following, but she feels sure that he came close to having advocacy of his diet in Iran. The fact that such advocacy never was heard in Iran is due to a criminal act. It is due to a murder, and the murder referred to here is not the murder of the Scarsdale diet doctor.

In fact, Dr. Tarnower, the creator of the Scarsdale Diet did fall victim to a murderer. He was killed by Jean Harris in 1979. The publicity created by that murder produced an increase in the sales of the book that had been written by the Scarsdale Diet doctor. Still, the Iranian who might have advocated for the Scardsdale Diet never read that book. She could not read English.

Neither did that Iranian woman get medical advice concerning the Scarsdale medical diet. That Iranian woman did come to the United States in 1977, and she did have a number of visits with various doctors. Those doctors found, however that they did not need to provide that Iranian woman with much added guidance concerning her diet. She had already chosen to eat a diet that contained a great many fruits.

One morning, not long after that Iranian woman had first arrived in the U.S., she made a gruesome discovery in the dumpster near her home. What she discovered was a dead body. She found a way to alert the authorities, who then contacted her son. That discovery encouraged her to return to Iran, but her return to Iran preceded her contact with the publicity about the Scarsdale medical diet. Thus she did not advocate for the diet while in Iran.

By 1979 the world situation had forced that same woman to return to the U.S. She came to the States in search of religious asylum. In Baltimore she happened to meet a future freelance writer, a woman who was familiar with the stories about the Scarsdale diet doctor. That future writer composed a letter for the legal authorities in Baltimore. With the help of that letter, the woman from Iran, who had gotten only a temporary visa to stay in America, managed to obtain an extension on her visa.

Later she got a green card, and then actual citizenship. Throughout that entire process, the woman from Iran received added support from the future freelance writer. Throughout the entire process, the future writer noted how well the actions of that Iranian woman advocated for the advice of the Scarsdale Diet doctor.

As mentioned above, the woman from Iran loved to eat fruit. She often purchased grapefruit. She would then appear to eat them with almost religious zeal. While she may not have known about the enzyme in those grapefruit, her figure certainly showed the effects of that enzyme. She was able to control her weight, while eating a diet with no shortage of rice and meat. She supplemented the grapefruit with many other fruits—watermelon, grapes, apples, oranges, plums and even pomegranates.

If this woman were ever to learn how to read and write English, she might present the world with a diet that calls for a less drastic approach than the Scarsdale diet. Her hypothetical diet, however, would still use the grapefruit as an aid for the achievement of weight loss.

Share this article with your friends

This artilce has been viewed: 0 times this month, and 186 times in total since published.